BLM: Fire III vs Fire I

So I got in a PUG for Garuda HM the other day with some douche and his DPS meter that kept sceaming my DPS sucked and I was a "worthless sack of shit" because I used what, at least I perceive to be, the commonly accepted optimal DPS rotation of fire III > fire I + firestarter fire III > blizz III/thunderIII stuff. He started ranting that "if you use fire I you're doing it wrong." According to him his DPS in the fight was 120, and mine was 90.

Needless to say the party didn't turn out well, and afterwards I tested his ramblings with the FFXIV App parser on one of the dummies outside of Ul'dah. The numbers are a bit inflated as both my character and the dummy were stationary without interrupts to the rotations, but using the rotation he was championing (repeated fire III > blizzIII/thunderIII) I was maxing out at just over 180 DPS and bottoming out in the 150s, while my rotation was scoring anywhere from 190 to 225 depending on the firestarter proc and hitting lows in the 180s for the umbral ice cycle.

So.. my question to the community is this: am I crazy and is he right, or was he full of it?

Thanks.

I think Fire 3 followed by Fire 1 repeatedly is better. Even so, when I was tanking a dungeon (on Warrior) I swear I saw the BLM was chaining Fire 3 but I still didn't say anything. As long as we don't wipe or you're not doing some really, really dumb stuff - play how you wanna play. And if all classes played the same the game would be boring. Some classes will do more damage than others, there's a lot of factors involved.
He's douching to be doing that to you guys; a toxic player making everyone have a bad time.

The fact that this guy felt the need to try and humiliate you in front of everyone just screams of someone who is getting their gratification through the game by being 'the man'. Fortunately for us there is a strong correlation between this noisy type of player and lack of ability.

I parsed using a dps meter for five mins using the two strategies you outlined. The first I used Fire III followed by Fire I until my mana was low and then I used Blizzard III and back into rotation again. I did not use thunder for either rotation simply because that will confound the strategy we want to see is optimal. The second rotation I simply alternated between Fire III, and Blizzard III.

For the 'normal' Fire III - Fire I rotation I got a dps of 116, and for the Fire III/Blizzard III ration (his rotation) I got a dps of 83.

So he was simply better geared and thought that made him knowledgeable. Unfortunately he didn't realise he was talking to someonewho would check his facts.

Parsers don't lie. If your rotation gives higher numbers on dummies than his, then yours is better. One tip I might add is that when you have to be on the move because you have to dodge stuff I would recommend you cast scathe. is instacast and at least lets you do some damage at a time where is impossible to cast your regular rotation.

We do Garuda HM in our FC and we allways go with a BLM. Its single target DPS never beats our dragoon DPS, but is still good. But the best thing a BLM brings for us is its limit break.

After 2 HR, DPS must kill the regening sister ASAP (hopefully it will be the one that spawned near the group). then the other sister. I as a tank pop my hallowed ground there to be able to take Garuda's Hits while shes buffed and give a break to Whms.

Then comes the clockwise kiting, use scathe if you have no time to cast regular rotation.

Then comes whirlwinds at the outside and everybody to center.

And this is where our BLM shines, when we are at center and the sisters spawn again and are all nice in the center, our BLM uses limit 3 on the area, one shoting both sisters and leaving only Garuda standing. You Just gotta learn how to time it well so you kill them both ASAP. If you use limit to fast it will miss one of the sisters, if you wait too much they will Regen garuda anyway.

Its just awesome AOE power =).

Pretty easy to just calculate it.
Fire 3 does 62.85 pot/sec
Fire 1 does 60 pot/sec

So if you're just shooting off one of those spells continuously fire 3 wins by a small margin (assuming you've got AFIII and it has the same modifier on both).
But that's obviously not the case. You have to regen mana, something that takes the same amount of time with either skill. Which means it's a higher % of time when doing F3. You also start off the burn phase with a reduced-time F3 in either case. With F1 you're getting free casts of F3.

What's the ratio of mana costs between f1 and f3? I'm pretty sure it's about the same per potency?

I think you might make the case that before you get Firestarter F3 is better. But with it, I think you're much more mana efficient, so your burn phase lasts longer keeping you in the high DPS state longer. That's better for sustained DPS.

He's full of it. Here's the stats, right off the game window: Fire 1: Cast 2.5, Potency: 150, MP cost: 319 (at level 50). Fire 3: cast 3.5, Potency: 220, MP cost: 532 (at level 50). A quick trip with the calculator shows that Fire 1 costs about 2.1 MP per Potency point, and outputs potency at 60/sec. Fire 3 costs about 2.4 MP per potency point, and outputs potency at about 62.9/sec. Upshot, damage from Fire 3 is about 14% more expensive and you gain only a slight increase in DPS. Plus all the tactical disadvantages of having a long cast time.

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Originally Posted by Elendil_Voronda

Parsers don't lie.

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Of course they do. Parsers lie all the time. For example, there still is not, to my knowledge, an FFXIV parser that correctly accounts for most DOT.

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Originally Posted by Conradus

Of course they do. Parsers lie all the time. For example, there still is not, to my knowledge, an FFXIV parser that correctly accounts for most DOT.

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As far as I know, the one I use take into account DOT, maybe ill test its accuracy, but so far looks spot on. But anyway we were comparing rotations of Fire/Ice, not taking into account thunder. Just to check wich fire/ice rotation does the most damage. If you do your thunders while on Umbral Ice while you wait for your mp to regen, it will have the same effect in either rotation.

But it wasn't the most important part of my post, BLM biggest power in Garuda Hard is its AOE limit level 3. Ill always bring one BLM in that fight.

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Originally Posted by Rbstr

Pretty easy to just calculate it.
Fire 3 does 62.85 pot/sec
Fire 1 does 60 pot/sec

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Your not taking into account the Astral Fire proc in that.

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Originally Posted by Elendil_Voronda

Your not taking into account the Astral Fire proc in that.

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Doesn't matter if AF gives the same bonus to both spells, the ratio remains the same.
....which I even say in the next line of that post.

Using Fire 3 constantly will never be the most efficient means of DPS just due to the MP usage involved. You can only get off 3 casts of Fire 3 back to back, whereas once you put up your initial Fire 3 for Astral 3 buff, you can keep spamming Fire while proc'ing the occasional instant cast Fire 3 for no MP usage.

Whoever is using Fire 3 continuously, with or without having Firestarter, is simply not playing efficiently due to the MP usage of Fire 3. Fire costs about 80% less MP than Fire 3, so you're going to get more casts off and do more damage.

i would just LOL at him in chat and ignore his ignorance, i will never let a toxic player ruin the game for me ever

Thanks for the feedback everyone. Glad to know I'm not a total scrub.